


Electric sheep

by SharpestRose



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-01
Updated: 2011-07-01
Packaged: 2017-10-20 21:56:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/217483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SharpestRose/pseuds/SharpestRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffybot, meet Faith. Faith, meet Buffybot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Electric sheep

She's a teenager, she's a teenager, she's a teenager.

She's a kid.

 

Faith keeps telling herself that, pointedly not looking at Dawn as the taxi splutters along through traffic, the shock of the new and still familiar scratching on her skin.

 

She's a kid. She's B's kid sister. Just stop it.

 

Faith's rarely felt so wired, like she's been slaying for hours without a single good kill. She never got into the prison sex thing, it was all skanky and nasty and Faith's had enough of skanky and nasty, thanks. So here she is, back out the outside, and just about ready to pop.

 

Of course Dawn's the one to come pick her up. There's some dark fire burning in the girl now, Faith can recognise something she's had herself for so long. In some weird way, they're kin. Faith's not feeling exactly sisterly right now, but she's got self-control. She is most certainly not entertaining the idea of jumping Dawn Summers in the back of a Los Angeles taxicab.

 

"There's uh, a thing. Back at the hotel. Kind of a welcome home present, I guess. I would have brought her to come pick you up, but all the metal detectors and stuff..." Dawn says, watching the utterly unattractive veiw out the window as if it's fascinating.

 

"Huh?"

 

"It's kind of a long story." Dawn shifts on her seat. "Spike made a - a sex robot, or had it made anyway, he didn't make it himself I don't think. She got her head knocked off when we were fighting Glory but when Buffy, the real Buffy... Willow reprogrammed her a bit. Then the Buffybot - we call her the Buffybot, usually - got ripped apart by these biker guys, but I didn't want her to die like that. I mean, I know she wasn't really alive to start with but I'm kind of not either and I know I sure wouldn't like to die like that. So I asked this guy at school who has a bit of a crush on me if he could help. He fixed her up pretty well, her skin layer's a bit gross in some places but otherwise she's good old Buffybot. So I brought her to you."

 

Faith just stares without speaking for a long beat. The driver pays no attention, Faith's sure he's heard much weirder stories on this shift. Then Faith blinks, smiles, and shakes her head.

 

"Whatever. You know, next to real life, jail was almost normal."

 

~

 

"Dawn! You're back! I made salad!"

 

That voice. Faith's already antsy skin breaks out in a fine sweat. She hasn't heard that voice in so long, and hardly ever with such happiness in the tone.

 

"Um, Buffybot, this is Faith, I told you about her?"

 

"Yes, you did."

 

Faith looks up from the floor to stare at the Buffybot for the first time. She's perfect, even with the strange spacey light in her eyes, the one thing that reminds everyone this Buffy's not quite right. Faith had forgotten how lovely Buffy was when she smiled.

 

"Hello Faith. Did you have a nice time in jail?"

 

The question's so innocent, the tone so friendly and light, Faith can't help but laugh.

 

"Yeah, I did. A real holiday."

 

"Oh crap crap crap!" Dawn looks at the chunky blue digital watch on her wrist and swears for a little while longer. "My Dad's meeting me at the movie theatre soon, he wants to take me to the new Pixar animation. I love those things, they're so cute. I didn't realise we took so long at the prison. I'll only be gone a couple of hours, ok? It's just," Dawn bounces from the heels of her feet to her toes and back again, rocking with childish energy. "My Dad and me haven't been on great terms lately, and I wanted to fix stuff."

 

"You should go. I can show Faith where all the rooms are, and make her salad if she wants some. I just learned how to make it, but I'm very good." Buffybot smiles her shiny berry smile again, earnest and bubbly at once.

 

"Yeah, go hang with your dad. I'll make sure robo-girl here doesn't get into any gunfights in Westworld."

 

Dawn looks puzzled. Faith rolls her eyes with a laugh.

 

"Old movie. Kids today, no respect for old stuff. Makes me feel all cultured to know a movie you don't. Go, go, you don't wanna be late."

 

"You sure?"

 

"Just go already!" Faith smiles, and it feels real good on her face. Dawn's a cool kid.

 

~

 

"Would you like a salad?"

 

Faith looks over at the Buffybot and smiles, leaving her unpacking for a minute and sitting on the edge of her bed, gesturing for the robot to sit beside her.

 

"No, I'm not really down with the salad situation. What do you want to do?"

 

"What do I want to do?" if Buffybot's smile could get more vacant, it does, as if she doesn't understand the question.

 

"That's what I said." Faith prompts. "You got all these microchips and wires in you, somewhere there's gotta be a list of hobbies, stuff you do for fun."

 

"I like to dream." Buffybot says after a fractional pause. "I think it's dreaming. My thought circuits don't ever stop running, even when I'm being recharged. But my awareness setting has to be switched off whenever repairs are being done or I need to be out of everybody's way. I have strange thoughts then. Willow had a book, she read it last summer when she was fixing me a lot. It was called 'Do androids dream of electric sheep?' and she used to look at me for a long time whenever she stopped reading. I don't dream of sheep, though. I have never seen a sheep, but I have pictures in my memory banks. Sometimes I dream about flying, or falling. And colors. I like colors, they're very pretty."

 

"You dream?" Faith asks. Buffybot nods.

 

"I think it was programmed into me so that I would dream about Spike, but I never have. I was made for him, to service his manly desires."

 

Faith feels incredibly ill for a passing moment. If she's ever back in Sunnydale she's going to beat the crap out of that William the Bloody guy. What a dirty rotten pervert, taking something as sweet and simple as this Buffybot and using it as a cheap inflatable doll.

 

Because Faith hasn't been entertaining similar notions, oh no.

 

"Did you like it? Servicing him?" Faith almost chokes on the fifth word.

 

"I was made to do it. I'm sure you like slaying the same way."

 

"Yeah." Faith nods. "I guess I see your point. You're pretty smart."

 

"Thankyou. Most people don't know that." Buffybot's smile is still shiny, still pretty, still vacant, but now Faith wonders if those things go bone deep, or wire deep, or whatever.

 

"Can I kiss you?" Faith asks, feeling a bit ashamed. Buffybot just closes her eyes and tilts her chin up, and Faith knows this is seriously screwed up but it looks so much like Buffy, but acts so different, better, not angry and hard all the time like the Buffy Faith has in her memory. And it's been so long since she felt other skin against hers, even if it's not real skin at all.

 

It tastes like any other kiss, Faith can't help but wonder if the flavour of Buffybot's mouth is deliberately created, the minty, sugary taste of summer afternoons, or if that's another strange thing most people assume not to know about the pretty little machine.

 

Faith's hand comes up to brush against the firm soft flesh of the Buffybot's breast, the pad of her thumb grazing one perfect nipple through the cotton dress she wears. Buffybot jumps, breaking the kiss and cocking her head to one side, looking confused.

 

"I think I had a malfunction. My circuits have never responded to touch in this way."

 

"What do you mean?"

 

"It must be something new Willow added to me." Buffybot muses, her own small hand coming up to touch the same way Faith's had, experimentally prodding the skin.

 

Faith almost laughs at that, a bitter feeling in her head. That's just the sort of crap that Red would have pulled, too. Some misguided notion about empowerment, and she gives the robot nerve endings in the pink bits without telling anybody.

 

"You like it?" Faith quizzes the Buffybot.

 

"Yes." Buffybot nods. "It feels a bit like dreaming. Is this what being sexy is?"

 

"Yeah." Faith grins. She loves this weird not-Buffy girl already, so many weird little twists in her personality that Faith can't predict.

 

"Can you do it again?"

 

"Yeah." Faith repeats, her breath a little less even, pressing her mouth to Buffybot's again.

 

There are marks on her body, like thick pale scars where tears have been mended imperfectly. Faith likes that, they're a matched pair in that way. She skates her fingertips over the lines, wondering at how much like real skin it feels, warm and damp and real.

 

Buffybot responds in kind, with a hesitant slowness to her movements that makes Faith smile through stingy little tears that are catching in her eyes, touching the old wound on Faith's stomach as if it's beautiful.

 

Faith kisses a trail down Buffybot's arms and stomach and hips, thankful almost to the point of crying to have another body against hers again, even if it's a body that doesn't breathe. It shudders and shakes just like a real girl, and that's all Faith needs in a lover at the moment. When she nudges her tongue against Buffybot's thigh, moving it aside so she can get in closer, the robot girl shivers a bit as if she's short-circuiting, twitching against Faith's cheek.

 

It's like warm wet velvet lightning, and Faith hopes that she doesn't get electrocuted because it wouldn't be that great for Dawn to come home and find her dead in this position. Buffybot shakes and whimpers a bit, and Faith knows that in some very real and significant way this is the Buffybot's first time. It makes her press in harder, hungrier.

 

"Oh." Buffybot says in a quite voice, as if her dictionary functions have shut down. "Oh, oh."

 

Buffybot's lipstick is smeared, her glassy eyes less obvious in this new, damp, intimate context, and she looks so real and human and beautiful that Faith keeps kissing her over and over until they're almost asleep.

 

"I think I like you best out of everybody I've known." Buffybot's tone is bright as always. "I'll make you waffles in the morning, and coffee. I can make good coffee. I'm very good at that."

 

"I'm sure you are. Now go to sleep, have nice electric dreams and stuff."

 

"I hope I dream of you." Buffybot snuggles against Faith's side and Faith didn't realise how hungry for touch she was until now. "I like having pictures of you in my head. And you smell nice."

 

"You can smell?"

 

"No, but I'm sure that you would smell nice if I could. Goodnight Faith."

 

"Goodnight Buffybot. Hey, why do they call you Buffybot, anyway? Why not just Buffy?"

 

"They don't need another Buffy."

 

"No, they never really did, did they?" Faith says softly, sadly.

 

"I'm sorry, have I said something incorrect?"

 

"No. You're perfect. We're perfect. Most people don't see that, that's all."


End file.
